by Eoin Colfer
‘Yeah,’ I say. ‘That’s it. I’m trying to be funny, as per usual, Mikey boy.’
‘Mikey boy! Mikey boy?’
‘Too much intimacy? We’re not that close, I take it.’
Silence for a moment, then, ‘Who the hell is this? Put Macey on.’
Deacon clicks her fingers to attract my attention.
‘Here we go,’ she says, all business, as though we’re off to meet our accountant.
I glance out the window. The Brass Ring is closed for business at this ungodly time of the morning, but I bet there’ll be business going on inside just the same. I remember Faber’s Benz from the previous day’s stakeout and see it parked across the road, which pretty much confirms we came to the right place.
‘Hello!’ shouts Irish Mike. ‘Who is this?’
‘It’s me, your close associate,’ I reply deadpan, hoping the FBI are listening. ‘What do you want to talk about, Mike? The murders, the drugs or the prostitution?’
Irish Mike is suddenly sweetness itself. ‘I don’t know what you’re talking about, mister. Actually, I’m betting this is a wrong number.’
‘Nooo,’ I say. ‘I recognise your number, Michael Madden. I put you on my speed dial when we were in Brooklyn, setting up the cocaine pipeline. Remember?’
Irish Mike hangs up.
The Brass Ring has doormen to stop undesirables getting in, whereas Slotz has doormen to eject the undesirables as soon as they’ve blown their wad. It’s hard to understand why a man like Jaryd Faber would spend five seconds in Vic’s seedy den when he’s obviously top dog in this place.
Maybe I’ll ask him before I shoot him.
The club is locked down tighter than a nuclear bunker during the zombie riots the media seems to feel are more or less inevitable, with steel blinds rolled down over the door and windows and not one but two alarm boxes bolted to the wall.
Deacon puts the police mobile in neutral and we spend a quiet moment sizing up the joint. While we are sizing up, I wedge my bundles of cash down behind the cruiser’s back seat. It would prey on my immortal soul if Faber shot me and stole my money.
‘Pretty impregnable,’ Ronelle admits finally. ‘I don’t know if we can take this place down.’
‘Not going through the front door. But they’re not going through the front door, not with a bleeding cop in the back seat.’
Deacon nods slowly. Some of her gusto has drained away. Maybe the truth of this situation is dawning on her, i.e. she’s chasing a wounded officer into a fortified club with only a murder suspect for backup. The uncomplicated days of being a detective must seem like a rosy dream.
‘Okay, so we go around back.’
‘We? I really think now is the time for you to call the cavalry. Faber will soon have a dying cop in there, if he hasn’t got one already. Nobody will believe a word he says. With any luck, he’ll get himself killed during the raid.’
Deacon pouts stubbornly. ‘No. The first thing Faber will do when he hears a siren is put the final nail in Goran’s coffin. And when I say nail I mean bullet and when I say coffin I mean head. I need to wrap this up myself.’
‘Be my guest.’
‘I thought you had a stake in this. Didn’t this asshole kill your girlfriend?’
This is true, and I had pushed it to the back of my mind, but even a reference to Connie sets my blood boiling.
‘Okay. We go around back. But let me have the shotgun.’
‘Not happening.’
I hold up the little Cobra .32. ‘I am not entering a building with this toy. I can barely get my finger through the trigger guard.’
We glare at each other like kids with trading cards until Deacon makes an offer.
‘I’ve got a blade.’
‘Good for you. Why don’t you throw it at the men with guns?’
‘I’ll take the Cobra and the pump. You take my Smith and Wesson.’
‘Any clips?’
‘Two on the holster.’
This is not a bad deal. ‘What about the blade? You going to use it?’
Deacon rolls her eyes, pulling an ivory-handled flick knife from its home behind the sun visor.
‘Anything else, McEvoy? You want my brassiere too?’
I mull this over. ‘What size are the cups?’
There’s only one obvious way around back, and that’s down the same alley where Deacon put half a dozen bullets into her partner. Ronelle moves quickly, keeping her eyes off the crushed bum-shack, picking her way through the black pennies of blood.
Then she changes her strategy, returns to the shack, pulls her gun and acts out the shooting again in total silence.
‘I’m dealing with it,’ she explains grudgingly, due to the fact that I’m looking over her shoulder. ‘By doing it again I dilute the act, making it less powerful.’
‘Ah,’ I say. ‘Freud?’
‘John Wayne Gacy.’
I must look shocked, because Deacon half grins. ‘Kidding. Dr Phil.’
‘Okay. That’s much better. I bet you wish you were diluting the act with shoes on.’
Deacon nods. ‘Dr Phil didn’t mention that.’
There is a small parking lot at the rear of the club which services three or four service entrances for adjacent or opposite businesses. I spot two restaurants and a pet shop that is receiving a shipment of canaries. The little birds sing when their crates are moved. A cacophony of shrill panic.
‘That’s how I feel,’ I comment to Deacon, strategically exposing a sensitive facet of my character that Dr Simon once assured me would encourage a desire to bond.
‘That’s how you sound too, bitch,’ says the detective, who obviously hasn’t read Simon’s article.
The Brass Ring opens on to the north corner of the parking lot, and there is a guy at the door, checking cars every five seconds, looking like he would dearly love to strangle every one of the canaries.
‘They haven’t arrived yet,’ I deduce, crouching behind a green recycling dumpster that smells like smoothies and reminds me that I haven’t eaten. ‘That guy is nervous. Look at him, sucking on his cigarette like his life depends on it. They’ve called ahead, but they’re not here yet.’
‘I concur, Sherlock,’ says Deacon, squatting beside me. ‘Look at that moron. Jumpier than Bambi. All you doormen got patience issues.’
All us doormen. I bet we look the same to Deacon.
‘I have an idea.’
Deacon does not clap delightedly or otherwise seem impressed. ‘You have an idea? That’s what my ex said after he tore the last rubber in the pack.’
This is one of those times when I do not want to know what happened next. I sulk a little until Deacon’s curiosity gets the better of her.
‘Okay, you enormous baby. Dazzle me.’
So I tell her my plan, which sounds stupid when you say it out loud, but all Deacon says is: ‘Who gets to do the hurtin’?’
Which makes me wonder just how much of a police officer is left inside this woman, which reminds me of an old joke that has no place in the modern world, except perhaps in County Sligo, where they love a good misogynism.
I stamp on the dumpster brake and put my weight on the push bar. It lurches forward easily, lighter than I expected. Plastic and cardboard only. Mostly. The lot is busy now with staff arriving for work and the pet guys humping birds into the store. There are a lot of cars for the doorman to keep his eye on.
The dumpster trundles noisily across the lot, and I graze a parked truck to make sure the doorman picks up on my approach.
Yeah, a big green dumpster, says Zeb. I think he might ‘pick up’ on that.
Oh, you’re back.
I never went away. And I will never go away unless you find me.
The doorman spots my head and shoulders bobbing behind the dumpster.
‘Hey, Trash Man. Get off the fucking ramp, okay? I got a car coming in.’
I shout over the tweeting. ‘Come on, guy. How many times I gotta tell you people. I am a recycling eng
ineer, not a trash man.’
Ghost Zeb chuckles. Nice. Build your character.
Build my character? What are you? Al Pacino now?
‘I could give a fuck what you call yourself. Get off the ramp. Or maybe you want me to tear one of your ears off.’
‘That’s a real specific threat,’ I say, trundling closer. ‘Sounds like you might actually do that.’
Doorman is proud. ‘That’s my thing. Specific threats. People don’t believe the vague stuff, but you go specific on their asses, then it’s a whole different thing.’
I stamp on the dumpster brake so it doesn’t slide back down the ramp.
‘I get it. Specific like I’m gonna open this lid and a big pissedoff cop is gonna put your lights out with the butt of her shotgun.’
Doorman chews this over. ‘That’s a little bit overkill. You know. Too much information. By the time I get through digesting that, shit is long over.’
‘Pre-cisely,’ I say in my Moriarty voice.
‘Huh?’ says Doorman.
‘Private joke,’ I say, then pull the lever.
Deacon pops up and puts Doorman’s lights out with the butt of her shotgun.
So now Doorman is in the dumpster with Deacon and I’m the new doorman. When they come with Goran, me and Deacon are going to take the car. Simple as that. Two of us, ready for action. Maximum four of them, not expecting trouble. It should be stressful, but easy.
Unless someone comes to check on you, says Ghost Zeb, ever the pessimist.
Okay. There is that.
And so long as Faber is not in the car. He knows your face.
Point taken. Now can you let me watch the lot?
And let’s not forget the possibility that Goran called someone else, not Faber. You could be in the wrong part of town.
This is a depressing thought and more plausible than Hairy Hands and Goran actually turning up here.
The doorway is a pretty typical delivery entrance, set atop a concrete ramp and flanked by reinforced double doors. From the corridor behind emanate various kitchen sounds and smells as the staff get the food started for the lunch trade, and from somewhere in the bowels comes the dull thump thump of a dance track’s bass line. A big screen over the bar, I’m guessing. A couple of kitchen workers pass me with barely a grunt, shoulders hunched against the chill, cigarette smoke trailing behind them like morning mist.
A black Benz with smoked passenger windows pulls into the lot doing about thirty m.p.h. more than it should be. The car whacks its underside on the ramp, shunting the dumpster across the asphalt. I see Hairy Hands gripping the passenger dash.
The dumpster’s wheels snag on the kerb, sending Doorman and Deacon flying through the air like a couple of superheroes. I swear Deacon manages to throw me a recriminating look before she crashes through the windscreen of a parked Chevy. Doorman lands nice and neat in the rear of the pet van, sending out an oomph of yellow canaries.
I am stunned. So much for stressful but easy. Canaries? Come on. Are there cameras rolling somewhere?
My great plan is completely blown. The car was supposed to stop short of the ramp, because of the great big green dumpster blocking the entrance. Then Goran’s rescuers/abductors would be forced to either move the dumpster or carry their wounded cop to the club door. While they were thus engaged, Deacon would do her hellcat jack-in-the-box bit and I would come in from the flank.
Now, however, Deacon is folded into the front seat of a Chevy and there are four big men getting out of Hairy Hands’ car.
Think, soldier. Improvise.
The lot is in chaos now. Screeching birds everywhere, flapping and launching salvoes of shite. A couple of pet shop guys with nets, calling to the canaries, like birds speak English. Car alarms screeching. Big men shouting at each other.
And then here I am, standing like a stone pillar.
Move. Save Deacon at least.
I must admit, it does cross my mind to fade into the background and save myself much heartache and possibly ballache too, but the notion fades fast and I find myself drawing the Smith and Wesson and sizing up the competition.
Drop Hairy Hands first, I reckon. He was the one who rescued Goran and he gets to sit in front. Plus he has the most expensive sunglasses. Alpha male without a doubt.
I put a shot into Hairy Hands’ elbow. An accident. I was aiming for the shoulder, but this gun is new to me. The elbow is gonna take years to heal up. Maybe later I’ll light a candle for this guy. For now I have his two friends to worry about. In about a second Hairy Hands’ buddies are going to figure out that I am not the house doorman, maybe half a second if they’re not as stupid as they look.
I get a couple of steps down the ramp when I feel twin jabs in my neck. Either I’ve been bitten by the world’s smallest vampire, or those jabs were the darts from an electric stun gun.
High voltage, sings Ghost Zeb. Rock and roll.
Then fifty thousand volts shoot down my spine and send me jittering down that ramp like a monkey with rock and roll in his soul.
AC/DC, I think. ‘Highway to Hell’.
Too easy.
There’s bacon frying somewhere. I can hear it popping in the pan. It’s a cruel thing to fry bacon near a man and not let him taste it. I swear I can smell salsa too, or something tangy, and I am so goddamn hungry.
Garibaldi biscuits. The French soldiers at the off-base observation posts always had Garibaldi biscuits. They charged outrageous prices for them, but I generally paid. Those guys had the best field rations. Stew, lasagne, casserole, topped off with a cool Gitane. I can smell all of those dishes now, and I hang around on the fringe of alertness savouring the memories.
Eventually the dreams evaporate and I come back into consciousness on the tail end of the notion I went out on.
‘Vampire!’ I shout, straining to jump out of the chair I am taped to.
‘Kee-rist almighty,’ says a familiar annoying voice. ‘Vampire? That Taser must have scrambled your brain, fella.’
I’m awake now but I feel like a brittle husk, as if the stun gun hollowed me out. I cough and spit out what feels like a lump of coal. I’m surprised not to be breathing fire. Faber is bent over, hands on knees, two feet away.
‘Faber, you prick.’
‘You know me, cop? Do I know you?’
My eyes are heavy and full of sand, but I force myself to blink until my surroundings sharpen up.
I’m in a kitchen. High-class place, all stainless steel and marble worktops. There’s bacon in the pan. Thank God. That means I’m not having a stroke. My weapons are gone and in spite of the situation I muster a little self-congratulation for stashing my cash.
‘Faber. I am starving. Honestly, man, those stun guns take it out of a person. You think I could have a BLT? Even just a B?’
This freaks Faber out and he does a little dance, clicking and pointing, trying to remember where he’s seen me. I use the time to absorb as much of the room as I can.
Six people that I can see. Faber dancing his ginger jig, dressed in something else from his wardrobe of anachronisms. Looks like a beige mohair suit with honest-to-God flares and Captain Kirk boots. Who the hell is this guy’s stylist? Engelbert Humperdinck?
Three of his guys are ranged behind him, jackets off, sleeves rolled up ready to do business. One new one, must be the stun gun guy. Deacon out cold, taped to what I presume is a meat gurney like some lab experiment, and Goran shivering on the floor, a pool of her watery blood shining on the concrete.
‘Stop pointing at me, man. Or so help me . . .’
Faber does a two-fingered point to show me who’s in charge. ‘The doorman. Daniel. In Slotz with that hostess.’
‘That’s right. Connie. You remember her?’
Something in my voice makes Faber take a few steps back. He puts one of his guys between him and me.
‘Yeah,’ he smirks. ‘I remember her. Someone punched her ticket, that’s what I hear. You ask me, she got what she deserved.’
I co
nsider throwing a fit. Straining against my bonds and cursing Faber’s seed, breed and generation. But I was once a professional soldier and I know any display would only serve to amuse my captors. So I take a few deep breaths and apparently calm myself.
‘We all get what we deserve, Faber. In the end.’
Faber steps from behind his man’s bulk. ‘Really? You think so, doorman? I deserve my drugs, and because of you I can’t get them.’
Okay. We’re about to get to the nub of this whole affair. There are drugs involved. Goran was obviously involved with these drugs.
Thinking about Goran, I glance over at her. She has stopped shivering and is staring at a point in the air. I’m guessing she sees angels.
‘Your pet cop is in a little discomfort.’
Faber doesn’t even look. ‘Screw her,’ he says, waving dismissively. ‘She ain’t getting up.’
‘You’re a sweet guy, Faber. I bet your wife tells you that every night, after you fill her in on your day. Dead hostesses, bleeding cops and whatnot.’
Faber helps himself to some bacon, patting it down with a square of kitchen paper. ‘What happened, Dan? Did you maybe see a movie where the good guy is a smartass and gets to live?’ He rolls the bacon strip and chews it. ‘That’s not how it works outside your shithole club. Okay, you had the muscle in Slotz, but not here.’
I have to ask, so I say: ‘I gotta ask, Faber. What the hell are you doing in Slotz? This is a nice place you’ve got here. Smells good even in the kitchen. I haven’t seen a single roach, for Chrissakes.’
I’m playing for time a little with this kind of small talk, but I would genuinely like to know. Faber is prepared to give me a moment, so long as he gets to talk about himself.
‘That’s an interesting question, Daniel, and I get where you’re coming from. You look at me, wearing a suit that’s worth more than you make in a year . . .’
I order my face not to react.
‘. . . and you ask yourself, what’s a successful, classy guy like Mister Faber doing in a shithole like Slotz.’
‘That’s pretty much it,’ I say, thinking that maybe I’m overplaying the straight face.
Faber checks the buttons on his waistcoat. ‘The thing is, Doorman Dan, all day I’m eating lobster with judges and drinking Dom with millionaires, and sometimes when the day is done, I feel like getting down and dirty, you know what I mean?’